Conjure
by WindCherry
Summary: Set Post-Advent Children: the Planet's savior receives a gift that he could never have dreamed of. Eventual yaoi.


**Conjure**

**by: Wind Cherry**

Synopsis: Set after Advent Children: the Planet's savior receives a gift that he could never have dreamed of. Yaoi. ZxC

Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VII and all its related characters and ideas belong not to me, but to Square Enix. This writing is purely for pleasure and not for monetary gain.

**oOo**

**Chapter I**

He knew the second he was roused from his sleep…it was one of _those _days again.

He awoke with the scent of _his_ shampoo lingering in the air, and the smell of deep forest, steel and lifestream all around him. He could even see the green tendrils of its energy spinning around his head. There was laughter on the air too, a casual amusement that made Cloud even more acutely aware of how much the past haunted him still.

As Cloud sat up in bed, quick flashes of memories flickered in and out of his line of vision. The unruly hair, the weave of a dark cotton SOLDIER's uniform, the corded arm muscles tapering into large and impossibly strong hands. He could see Zack sitting on the edge of his bed, offhandedly leaning towards him and smiling that disarming smile of his.

It was on days like this that his apparition was almost tangible, and Cloud wished for nothing more than to be able to reach out and actually find comfortingly solid flesh and bone instead of thin air.

But Cloud knew better than to wish.

Instead, he rose from his makeshift bed and began to fix himself breakfast with a ghost. And in his mind the grinning Zack followed him.

He sometimes found comfort in Zack's presence, but more often than not he regretted taking up the man's time even in death. As his best friend and only confidant, Zack had given himself shamelessly to Cloud while they were in Midgar, and then sacrificed himself after Nibelheim. And for that, Cloud had assured Zack he would live for the both of them.

But that promise had gone flying straight out the window along with what little social skills he possessed. And now Cloud lived in this makeshift cabin in this middle of nowhere, deep in a forest - alone. He had brought few things with him from Midgar when he moved. His materia that he recovered from the remnants, his weapons and their cleaning kits, and the buster sword - which he felt he could no longer leave outside to rust. For years it had stood where Zack had fallen, but Cloud became reluctant to watch the deterioration of that grand weapon at the same place where his SOLDIER friend had given it to him during his final moments.

He had once wished to become a SOLDIER - a hero just like Zack, and now Cloud was the savior of the Planet. Except that his path to glory was not as he had ever imagined it. There was no steady, predictable climb through the Shinra military to become a high-class warrior like those he emulated. Instead, his journey was a torturous and bloody one. He lost his closest friends, and killed the man he looked up to. He was captured and experimented on, unwillingly treated with lifestream and Jenova cells to raise his weak body's prowess to that of a SOLDIER's level. And then he saved the world, twice over. Yet still he hated himself for being so weak - weak enough to always need protection from those who were dead.

Cloud reasoned retrospectively that he could never have cut it in the military. He had been too short, too small, and too graceless. So he predictably failed the entrance exams. And that was despite the extra training from a 1st class SOLDIER. One who was always "picking up strays", as Zack's many friends had termed that peculiar quirk.

It was that same SOLDIER, too, who sought to make Cloud's depressing life in Midgar livable even though he was a failed cadet - one who couldn't perform well to save his life or anyone else's.

Zachary Fair had made the time for him, always.

And in the end, he had died for him.

And now here Cloud was, years after Zack's death, unable to let the man go. It wasn't a conscious effort - many times he regretted seeing his old friend so clearly. It just brought the pain and guilt back so sharply. If he had it his way, he supposed that Zack would be resting in the lifestream with Aerith, and Cloud would be alone with his less ephemeral thoughts.

He found it amusing that the experiments that had made him strong enough to save the Planet were also keeping him alive and almost ageless to face his regrets. And for longer than any normal person had to suffer. He really hadn't aged a day since exiting Hojo's lab with Zack. But every day since then, he had remembered and repented. Sometimes he wished he didn't have to think about it anymore and often welcomed the thought of death. But Cloud doubted the Ancients would let him rest even after dying.

As he wandered to the opposite end of the small cabin to gather supplies for his meal, Zack silently dogged his every step. His vision of his friend was communicating less and less nowadays. Cloud wondered if that was because he was forgetting what Zack sounded like, but he knew that could never be true. His memories of his friend were as stark and realistic as ever, and he cherished each one.

Cloud reached to pick up a pot and the bland mash that almost reminded him of standard issue rations. As he started a fire in the hearth, he glanced to see Zack still close by, leaning against the wall with his feet crossed at the ankles and his arms crossed at his chest. He was still smiling, but it was a sad, pitying smile. And it made Cloud shameful to know that he _still_ invoked sympathy from his best friend.

_I suppose I'll never be anything but a head case. _Feeling an acute self-loathing, Cloud quickly decided he needed to get away from that look before he threw himself against the buster sword in the corner. He swung the boiling pot out of the fire and all but ran out the cabin door, looking back to note that Zack's ghost had stayed where it was.

Outside it was raining hard and the drops falling from the dark morning sky were as large and heavy as they usually were in a forest, rolling off the trees and gaining mass by joining together. The rain pounded against his face and chest and Cloud kept on running, finding some comfort in the numbing drum of water. The moist scent of musk and pine was sharp in the air, and the blanket of dead needles and leaves on the forest floor dampened his heavy footfalls. As he ran, he saw visions of Zack in Midgar, in the mountains, in Nibelheim. Cloud's head began to ache with the memories as he tried to steady his pace and his raging thoughts. His breathing quickly became ragged, and green wisps of energy started floating up from the forest floor.

Cloud smelled lifestream all around him.

Something was amiss. There were no pockets of lifestream in this area; he had made sure of that before settling in. Cloud began to hear the voices of the Ancients in his head as well, chanting unintelligibly. He stopped for a moment, bent double with the sounds and sights crashing around in his head. His skin began to tingle with their power, and Cloud felt nauseated as the world began to spin.

And then it all went silent…and he felt himself falling.

**oOo**

When he awoke, he saw a blurry Zack kneeling over him with concern written all over his face. Cloud sighed internally, knowing that he wasn't escaping any of his ghosts today. As he made a move to sit up, he noted that his head felt like it had been struck by a summons and that there was an exceptionally strong ringing in his ears.

Zack's lips were moving but all Cloud heard was a garbled mush of sound.

Cloud steadied himself on one elbow while his vision came into focus. Zack looked as he always did, strong and safe and confident. And real. As his stomach tightened at the sight, Cloud wished that he didn't always look so real. It wasn't right.

As he turned his body to sit up, Cloud moaned as another wave of nausea passed. The lifestream rarely disturbed him this much anymore, and it had been a long time since he had experienced their after-effects.

Zack steadied him with a firm hand on his back.

_That's impossible! _Cloud felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise as he turned to look at his friend. The rain that was still falling was bouncing off Zack's armor, and running down his spiky hair to drip on his face: rain that should have been running right _through_ him.

The Planet's savior suddenly felt weaker, even as he began to hear what his somehow _solid_ friend was saying.

"Cloud? Hey, I know you missed me but come on! The damsel in distress act doesn't suit you buddy! Are you alright?"

Cloud reached out to place a shaking hand on the SOLDIER's face, and when it contacted the solid and warm skin and bone of his best friend, he looked into Zack's glowing mako eyes and promptly fainted dead away.

**oOo**

To be continued...

Thank you for reading! Please review, I love to know what my readers think!


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